PS. 

3515 

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H03 








Book_.^ikSjS:^ 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



To Her whose sunny 
face and heart and soul 
have made brighter all 
that is mine, this little 
book. 



The Great Optimist 

AND OTHER ESSAYS 



Leigh Mitchell Hodges 

"MITCHELL" 



|Mg| 



Hand Colored and Printed by 

DODGE PUBLISHING COMPANY 

23 East 20th Street, New York 



THE LIBRARY OF 
CONGRESS. 

Two Copies Received 

SEP 23 !903 

/ Copyright Entry 
CLASS «U XXc 
COPY B. 



:J 



b^S 



Copyright, 1903 

By 

Dodge Publishing Company 

[The Great Optimist-2] 






>1 



CONTENTS 



I. 


The Great Optimist 


II. 


The Darkened Cage 


III. 


A Spring-Song 


IV. 


Making the Most 


V. 


The Flag 


VI. 


"Ma Brither" 


VII. 


Failure 


VIII. 


The Grasshopper 


IX. 


My Friend 


X. 


Thanksgiving 




no suddenly tbere 
waswitbtbeJItidel 
a multitude of tbe 
fieai^enly l)o$t 
praising God and saying^ 
6lory to God in tbe bidb= 
est and on eartb Deace> 
good will toward men* 



I 



Is A T before the open fire last night— the eve 
of this high day — and half-way dreamed again 
The Story. Among the resting hills of old Ju- 
dea were the flocks sleep-folded, and under the 
trees the shepherds guarded them. The little 
town of the House of Bread was sleeping, too, 
save in a stable, where a woman lay, and near 
her a strong man keeping watch. Away to the 
west Rome slumbered in her glory, and further 
on beyond the uncoursed seas the dream and 
hope of future times lay yet unknown. All was 
quiet and very peaceful in Bethlehem. Then 
came the first faint cry of one new-born, and 
that triumphant burst of song from out the 
skies, and the Wise Men bending low before the 
Manger, and then the long line of fruitful years 
which brings us to the present. 

The lesson of that first Christmas needs no 
retelling, for it repeats itself on each successive 
dawning of the day. The story of how that 
Manger was the first throne of the King of 
Kings can be made no more impressive than is 
its own simple record. Nineteen centuries have 



10 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

shown how it changed the whole course of 
human acts and thought ; how it brought to men 
a new conception of life and recast their hopes 
and their being. Yet how many have ever 
thought of Him as the Great Optimist! How 
many realize that the song of the angels was in 
truth the divine prelude to Hope and Faith and 
Love — the things that have given us happiness! 

It v/as He who made known to men that 
pain and want and suffering are but things of 
the moment — that beyond and above them are 
peace and joy and life. He it was who turned 
to the flowers of the field and the birds of the 
air, and drew from Nature the true lessons of 
living. From Him came the comforting truth 
that human fear is the foundation of human 
woe; that when we have conquered it we 
have gained the heights of mortal happiness. 
He it was who, through the most disappointing 
of human lives, with a cowshed for a cradle 
and Calvary for a shroud, still held to the better 
things, and saw through the night the glory of 
the noontide. If He could hope, on that black 
hill of the three crosses, what man amon^^ us 
has the right to despair? 

The highest definition of optimism is hope. 
The highest hope possible is to be like Him. 
Consider His life, you who toil and drag and 



THE GREAT OPTIMIST ii 

suffer and are weary. No child so poor who 
was not fairer born than He. No man so low 
who is not better treated. Yet always of good 
cheer; always speaking words of comfort; ever 
loving, merciful and just, even to that most de- 
grading of deaths. Can we wonder that the very 
stars of heaven joined in the chorus of that song? 
Can we wonder at the millions who have clung 
and are clinging to its far-borne echoes? Can 
we not do more? May we not on this, His natal 
day, set high our hopes anew, and rejoicing in 
Him and in them, put away the fears that have 
felled us? So long as this ball rolls on in its 
appointed place among the spheres it shall be 
the Star of Suffering. So long as winter doffs 
its white robe to show the gleam of summer's 
green, there shall be toil a-plenty, and strivings 
after lost things and wants and loves unsatisfied. 
But He had all of these to bear, and is it not a 
privilege that we may be like Him, if only in such 
wise? 

The skies, the sun, and Nature to her small- 
est blade of grass are ever repeating that Life. 
There are clouds and cold winds, but ever 
and anon are the sunlight and the flowers. 
There are burdens and sorrows that weigh 
heavily and would seem to crush, but standing 
strong in the love of man and the trust of God 



12 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

and the hope of a brighter day to come, we can, 
if we will, climb the long slope in the rarest of 
happiness, and rest in peace at evening. From 
out the stable of each life may issue the hopes 
and joys of Eternity. 

We are human, and as such must we strive 
on, endeavoring each day to stand a little higher, 
a little more firmly. We must never lose hope. 
We must never despair. In the gloomiest hours 
we must have an ear to that best of the songs 
of earth, and a thought for that greatest of 
conquerings — the victory of the Child of Beth- 
lehem. 

Now, peace on earth, good will toward men, 

With joy, and faith, and love; 
That, though the way be rough and long. 
There still is Light above. 




or bim who sings in 
tbe dark tbere is aU 
ways iigbt— be makes 
it, and none can sbut 
it from bim. 



n 



DO you know that some birds are taught to 
sing by having their cages darkened? 
Then the little things long for the light, 
and in some way realize they must make a sound 
that the master of their light and darkness may 
hear, so they peep a faint note or two. These 
are always faint at first, but they are always 
rewarded with a brief space of sun. And at length 
the small songster comes to know that if it 
would live in light it must sing, and soon it finds 
that the faint notes have grown strong and clear, 
from the continued plea for deliverance, and 
finally its song is rare and beautiful and the 
master is willing it should have much light in 
return for a little singing. 

Are not some of us birds caged in by the 
limitations of humanity? Is not that cage often 
darkened by sorrow and disappointment and 
seeming ill-fortune? Yet how is the Master to 
learn that we love the brighter, better things? 
Who but would sing qviih the sun!— but who 
sings for the sun shows clearly his love of it. 
And in the first note we attempt— be it ever so 

13 



14 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

rude and weak, we gain an ear that is leaning 
to listen, and a hand that is always ready, lifts 
the shadow, at least for a little. 

Like the bird, which after many days of 
darkness and many days of singing itself again 
into the light, finds its little voice grown strong 
and sure, we who sing on through our trials 
and burdening shall some morning find our own 
voices sweetened and greatened from the long 
practice. The wavering note becomes steady; 
the harsh tone gently clear. Then do we know, 
O men and women, that the shadows of this 
world are sent but to train the weak voices and 
fit them for their places in the choir invisible, 

"Of those immortal dead who live again 
In minds made better by their presence: live 
In pulses stirred to generosity, 
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn 
For miserable aims that end with self. 
In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars, 
And with their mild persistence urge man's search 
To vaster issues.** 

—George Eliot* 




I^EV form thi perfect 
prelude to God's areat 
cycle of song -these 
first days of the earl= 
test season. 



m 

HOW fine are these first spring-like days! 
The air fairly thrills with the promise of 
returning life, and the morning prophecy 
of the feathered wanderers that have come back 
sounds a cheery prelude to the day's work. 
Here and there along the open stretches are just 
the faintest touches of green— the starting 
strokes of a Master's brush, whose broad canvas 
shall so soon glow with the beauties of the 
wakened world. The day lengthens, as if it 
loved now to linger. The sun is up earlier each 
morning, that he may miss less and less of the 
marvelous transformation. And only man com- 
plains. "Spring-fever.'* 

What a misnomer! Have tired heads and 
lazy legs and yawns aught to do with a realm 
springing into life and action! Is there not 
music everywhere to which he may time his 
steps and his labor? Has not the Old Mother, 
once again young, taken her seat at the organ— 
this great organ, with pipes reaching clear up to 
the sky and a hundred thousand stops? The 
south wind is turned on and the Vox Humana 

15 



i6 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

pulled out. With a soft touch she tests the 
treble, and there comes the shrill note of a bird. 
Then another note is sounded and we have the 
blithe melody of the lark— not so clear and fine 
as it will be, for her fingers are a bit stiff as yet. 
And naturally — how could Nature be otherwise! 
— she tires after playing a few days, and there's a 
dull intermission of cloud and rain. But the rest 
shall only strengthen her, and some morning the 
great pipes, all agleam with gold, shall give forth 
the first glad movement of the long symphony, 
and a thousand stops will help swell the melody, 
and the flowers will lift their gay heads, and the 
trees burst into bud, and the concert of concerts 
begin. 

Let us wake with the flowers and birds, the 
trees and streams. Let us open our ears and 
our hearts to the music that is everywhere. Let 
us lay aside our "winter garments of repent- 
ance" and be glad with the player of these 
sprightly measures. 




C is not bow much we 
have, but bow we use 
it; and every man 
holds the possibilities 
of untold wealth with= 
in his own beind* 



IV 



PERCHANCE you prefaced your break- 
fast this day with an apple — a shiny 
red one, maybe, or a yellow and juicy 
fellow. Did you simply pare and eat it, while 
chatting of the weather, or did you attend some- 
what more carefully the piece of fruit? Saw 
you the symmetry of its form, the grace of 
its curves, the beauty and richness of its color- 
ing? There were sculpture and painting! Did 
you smell of it before partaking? No perfume 
more gratifying! Did you notice how firm and 
fair was the interior, how curiously the whole 
was made? There was science, skill. And did 
you stop to think how but a little while gone, 
that tasty morsel was a small, frail flower on a 
slender twig ; then a tiny hard knot of green, and 
at length a blushing boy of an apple? There was 
an Infinite Power! So you see how so small a 
thing as an apple and so common an act as the 
eating of it, may reveal much that is good and 
high. 

It is a noble art, better worth cultivating 
than many a showier one, to make the most of 

17 



i8 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

the things that are. The willingness and ability 
to get out of everything all the good that lies 
therein, and to apply it profitably is at once 
helpful and comforting. As with the eating of 
an apple, there is, in most of the seemingly or- 
dinary happenings or duties of the day, sufficient 
of interest and pleasure to make much of little, 
or sometimes to cover up difficulties and 
drudgery. 

This very willingness to accept what is, in 
its fulness, determines poverty and plenty more 
than do money and lands. It is the determina- 
tion to derive from such as we have and can do 
all of beneficence in them, that fills our hearts 
and souls with a buoyant gratitude for the wealth 
of our blessings. In truth, it is the cheerful 
doing of the apparently insignificant tasks with 
the same enthusiasm which attends us 'in those of 
vaster moment, that brings to us a full return of 
peace. He who finds in an apple art, science, 
knowledge and religion is more to be envied 
than he who sees in a carving by Michaelangelo 
only the dollars and cents he paid therefor. 




here can be no firm 
ground for any t>e$$i= 
mistt so long a$ tbe 
American flag stands 
for the principles tbat 
gave it birth* 



V 



THE sun was dropping behind a gray wall 
in the west-sky. Through a loop-hole 
in the cloud parapet, one gold gleam 
shot back into the world. As if trained on the 
very spot, and there alone, it lighted the folds of 
a flag floating high over the roofs and chimneys 
of the city. The red bars of it were made more 
red ; the white ones took on the ruddy tinge of 
wounded day, and the stars shone pink against 
their field of blue — all purpled in that glow. And 
I thought, as I saw it thus blazoned against the 
dark sky, how much is wafted to us in the sway- 
ing of those stripes and stars ! 

It seemed a moment made for prayer. It 
was almost as if the hand of the Maker pointed 
a great gold finger at the emblem of His best 
gift — Freedom. 

We men and women who toil and travail 
in the shadow of that waving — do we stop often 
enough to consider its meaning, its guarantee? 
Is it to many of us more than a bit of color 
swung to catch the breeze and fittingly finish 

19 



20 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

the end of a flagstaff? It must be, and far more. 
Next to the comforting consciousness of a Divine 
hand which guides and guards us, that flag 
should mean peace of mind and spirit. The wish 
has often come, and still remains, that every 
American boy be taught to bare his head to that 
standard, as to a woman. For the respect 
rightly paid her is a debt to Motherhood, and 
that Motherhood would count for little were it 
not extended and enlarged in the Motherhood of 
an upright nation! 

From trials and hardships, it is well to look 
up sometimes to that piece of blood-baptized 
bunting, which daily unfolds its high message. 
It is well to read in those bars of crimson the 
story of lives laid down for rights and princi- 
ples; in those alternate stripes of white, the 
lesson of peace. We see in that starred square 
the growing strength and increasing good of the 
nation. Bear all these no echo of help, no 
message of hope? Send they no thrill through 
the being? Can we not find in them food for 
fairer dreams? And high-built dreams oft end 
in living things! 




mootb and level is tbe 
road of life if only our 
burdens are borne in 
love. 



VI 



IAN MACLAREN tells somewhere a sweet 
stoix. of his native Scotland— that while 
sauntering along a country lane one hot 
afternoon, he met a bonnie wee lass, all 
humped up and red, and puffing with the weight 
of a chubby laddie she was carrying. 

"Isn't he too heavy for you?" asked the 
dominie. 

"He's not hivvy, sir," came the reply, with 
a smile of loving pride; "he's ma brither!" 

How vastly different this old world might 
be if more of us could or would make brothers 
of our burdens! Love is the greatest of all 
lighteners, and that which is borne lovingly sel- 
dom weighs sorely. Yet the lanes of labor are 
crowded with men and women who bend and 
sigh, and grow weary apace, because they are 
carrying strangers! To them the day's task is 
only monotonous or galling— there is nothing 
companionable or brotherly about it. In this 
spirit too often is it borne. How much happier 
might the heart be, how much more willing the 
hands, if place were more commonly given to 



21 



22 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

the great thought that even in the humblest and 
least-seen achievement is hidden a part needed 
in developing this divinest of dramas! Who, 
feeling the truth of this within, might not say 
of the meanest task: 

"It*s not hiwy, sir; it*s ma brither!** 

No man's Scotland is all abloom with 
heather. In the vales are thickets, and up in 
the hills, barren and jagged precipices threaten 
dire things. Times come, I know, when even 
the loads we carry lovingly, do bear down on 
us somewhat, and when the lane seems longer 
than we can traverse. But I know, too— and I love 
to feel that the world is full of those who are with 
me in this — that the brightest morning is that 
which ends a night of unrivaled darkness; that 
the green of spring never again glows with quite 
the same charm as in that first blade which 
pushes upward to the light through the brown 
blanket of dead leaves. And beyond this, from 
the record of the years that have been, I know 
that they who hope to leave this place better 
for having lived in it, must learn to bear pa- 
tiently, if not in love, what is here their portion. 

It is only in feeling, in knowing that our 
part, however small, is essential to the final 
betterment of things that we can make it truly 



THE GREAT OPTIMIST 23 

so. It is only through a brother*s love for that 
which is given us to carry here that we can 
have peace and can smile as we go along. The 
world around may see little and know less, but 
what does that matter. There is One who does 
know all, and who measures justly; whose por- 
tioning should never weigh heavily — for He's ma 
Brither! 




ailure i$ often that 
moriiinabourofdark= 
tie$$ wbtcb proceeds 
tbc dawning of tbe 
day of Success. 



vn 



H 



EAVEN is probably a place for those 
who have failed on earth." 



There is a strange sound about this, is 
there not? But let us stop and consider. What is 
failure? Had you and I been one of that jeering 
throng that crowded the way to Calvary, we had 
answered by pointing at the Christ, pale, bleed- 
ing, and burdened. Had we been near when a 
neglected beggar died in a little town of Spain 
on May 20, 1506, we might have said Columbus. 
If, perchance, we had strayed into Rouen one 
day centuries back, and there seen a saint-faced 
woman burning to death, we would have made 
reply — Joan of Arc. Again, if in the winter of 
1777 we had wandered into a camp of starved 
soldiers, freezing in a Pennsylvania valley, we 
could scarce have hesitated saying, "The cause 
to which these wretches are clinging." These 
were failures — lives thrown away, in the estima- 
tion of their contemporaries among men. But 
what of Christianity; what of the Americas; 
of the one woman who has place among the 

25 



26 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

greatest; of our own Government? Do you 
count them failures? 

And do you wonder that we have such say- 
ings as "Success lies in failure" and "Victory is 
in defeat?" Perhaps a fuller knowledge of the 
doings of men in the long line of years that 
stretch between us and the earlier ages, might 
remove that wonder and leave us staring in 
amazement at him who would dare refute such 
truths. Yet, knowing all this from the actual 
records of sixty centuries, we still set our stand- 
ards in fields wholly material and we still strive 
toward them, not counting the cost ; with an eye 
only for the possible gain. We do it because the 
world calls this success. We take the world at 
its word, without often stopping to think of, or 
for, our own selves. And the truth is, that suc- 
cess is not wealth — save of good traits and 
character. It is not lands and moneys and fine 
raiment. It never was, and furthermore, it 
never can be. Nor is it power, position or pres- 
tige. Nine out of ten times it is apparent failure, 
and the tenth time it rises from apparent failure. 
Nine out of ten times the world brands it as use- 
lessness, or fanaticism, or diseased mentality. 
But the world does not know! 

It depends chiefly whether you are work- 
ing for the world's praise or the world's 



THE GREAT OPTIMIST 27 

good, how its commendation or its condem- 
nation is given. But if you will work for 
the praise of that inner spirit which, for lack 
of a better name, we call conscience, no pain 
shall be felt at what the world does or says. In 
truth, if you have a high and good purpose and 
honestly try to attain it, you must apparently fail 
in some measure, because all strength is founded 
on unseen supports, and the highest tower is 
that whose base extends the farthest under 
ground. But mere failure should be the last 
thing to daunt you. Remember how the oyster 
mends its wounded shell — with pearl! 




be whole universe is 
a poem, whose pon= 
derous rhythm and 
majestic metre be» 
spealt the author= 
ship of 6od. 



vin 



ONE Wednesday afternoon back in the baby 
days of the last century, three poets who 
were friends met together, as was their 
weekly custom. Before parting, each agreed to 
write a sonnet on "The Grasshopper," and to read 
it the following Wednesday. How would you like 
to have been there when John Keats and Percy 
Shelley and Leigh Hunt— for they were the 
friends — read each his fourteen lines ! How would 
you like to have heard Keats repeat that first 
line of his sonnet — those immortal seven words : 
" The poetry of earth is never dead." 
Sometimes comes the wonder if we realize, 
when we read the songs of the poets, that around 
us on every side, and well within our reach if 
only we put out our hearts, are the very causes 
for these outbursts of soul! We wander away 
charmed by the big and the showy, and it seldom 
occurs to us that in so small and common a crea- 
tion as the grasshopper is hidden great beauty. 
We forget that in the crowning of common 
things we make monarchs. 

For him who can find in some tiny flower 
or bird, food for a day's study and a week's 

29 



30 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

thought, is opened a field of happiness whose 
confines are well-nigh limitless. He may trace 
the whole course of time in the study of one 
daisy, or read the history of the ages in a bit of 
broken stone. It is not always on the surface, 
neither is gold nor the diamond, but it is there 
if one will seek. The world of nature is a great 
book, open to every one who will turn its pages, 
and within that book is writ so much of beauty 
and wonder and helpfulness that the reader is 
sure to forget the little pains and cares that slip 
almost daily into life. 

Indeed, "the poetry of earth is never dead." 
To-day it sleeps under the brown and withered 
leaves, its sighing bringing to us new and deeper 
thoughts; to-morrow it is echoed in the crystal 
chorus of a thousand birds, or nestles in the color 
and fragrance of a field of bloom. To-night it 
sways us with its thunderous chansons ; at morn- 
ing it pours over earth a flood of golden hopes. 
Now it is an epic, in the bended figure of one of 
the world's unfortunates ; again, a sonnet in the 
sweet grace of a woman, or a rippling ballad in 
the laugh of a fair child. All the poems written 
of men are but translations of nature, and to each 
of us is the possibility of reading them in the 
original, if we but will. 




riendship i$ one of 
tbe few words of eartb 
that will be compre= 
bended of souls in 
tbe hereafter* 



K 



THE nights are nearing when shooting stars 
scratch the purple skies. Across the dark- 
ened dome the tramps of heaven hurry, 
blazing an instant, then going out forever. A 
moment they charm, but even the memory is 
quickly gone, and again we turn to those far-set 
specks of light which, from the earliest times, 
have been as now. Small though they be, and 
infinitesimal amid the countless legions, we 
know where to find them each clear night, and 
they never disappoint us. Through long watches 
of cloud curtaining we may still be sure of them 
— sure that when the veil is at length dissolved, 
we shall see our friends in their old places. 

Friend — what a word! Blessed is he who 
can boast one, in the full meaning. Who has 
two is rich beyond words, and more than that 
marks one truly loved of the Maker. There may 
be a score of friendly acquaintances, but my 
"friend** is as different from these as is the fixed 
star from the meteor. My "friend" is that one 
who came into my life as did the stars, without 
any great flashing of lights; whose place seems 

31 



32 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

as truly foreordained as the dwellings of those 
distant beacons. My "friend" is constant, like 
that high star, and^though distance and days come 
between us, as do clouds between it and me, I 
know my friend is still there, shining with the 
same dear, steady light, and when the distance 
and days are melted away I shall find it so. 

My "friend" is the one before whom I need 
not fear to unfold all that I am. That one is the 
first to appreciate the good ; the last to leave me 
on account of the evil. In short, my "friend" 
is some part of my own self, which after many 
or few years, I have met again, purified and 
made better by the stewardship exercised over it. 

My "friend" is a great part of the true 
wealth open to every life which will allow itself 
to be truly unfolded. For each note given forth 
from the heart's harp-strings finds an answering 
note somewhere, and if that note be burdened 
only with the best melody, it shall some day 
come back finely blended with a note of friend- 
ship. We cannot "make" friends. We cannot 
often " choose " them. In that same place where 
is put into one heart the torch that is sometime 
to light the candle of another, all true friend- 
ships are planned, and into our human care is 
entrusted only the building — and the joy! 




bat our hearts may be 
unfeianedly thankful, 
and that we show forth 
our praise not only with 
our lips, but in our 
lives. 

(^Book of Commo?i Prayer.) 



10 



X 



TO-DAY our thoughts turn to a lone rock on 
the New England coast. Standing beside 
that milestone in the path of the progress 
of men and nations, and looking back across the 
years that have come and gone since the Pil- 
grims, we face the miracle of the ages. For on 
that scant foundation has been builded the best 
of the temples of Time — a free government with- 
out a parallel in history. The promise of one 
bleak day is a thousand-fold fulfilled. In com- 
pany with a host of heroes whose like has seldom 
been, they sleep in peace who cast to the winds 
from that barren spot the seeds of what has 
come to pass. And in peace with a wondering 
world, we reap the harvest. And in thankful- 
ness. 

Is it too much, as we bend before the Maker 
of Nations, to dwell awhile on the struggles of 
those earlier years, yet remembering how an 
unseen hand seemed ever to guide aright, and 
to guard? Shall we forget the dangers, suffer- 
ing and deaths which were borne that just princi- 
ples might live, and high standards have their 



34 THE GREAT OPTIMIST 

being and flourish? And as we behold the line 
of phantom figures that rise from out the mist, 
they seem to live again in all the vigor and 
strength of their first existence. 

They are not dead; they stand arrayed 
In robes aglow with what is good and true. 
Theirs is the noblest emblem Time has made — 
The red of martyrdom, the white of peace, 
And of God's everlasting dome, the blue. 

When we come back to the present, and rise 
to the duties that are, let it be with more strength 
to strive — not for the seen greatness, since that 
fades, but for those higher ends that serve God 
and man alike. We have kept well the trust, 
yet sometimes we have faltered. Much that 
they would and we might have done, remains 
undone to-day. It is not alone, or enough for 
us to ask forgiveness. It is also our duty, and 
our first duty, to grasp what has gone wrong 
and right it now. Like them we are human, 
but God never asks more than man can give. 
They laid the foundation and left the structure 
to our rearing and our care. 

They held to the hand rail of Heaven while 
they set the stones. Did they wrong? Then let 
us likewise. Let us temper progress with high 
purpose. Let us alloy gain with good and firm- 
ness with faith. Let us blend with all labor, 



THE GREAT OPTIMIST 35 

love. Then when our children's children kneel 
as we kneel to-day, it shall be in a better, a 
nobler, and a more glorious land. Amen! 



1903 



LIBRARY OF CONGRF<;c; 

liiiili 

015 938 201 1 



